Chef Alex Atala, 55, has been heavily criticized on social media for a comment labeled as sexist directed at cook Helena Rizzo, 45, during his participation in MasterChef (Band). After punctuating the professional qualities of judges Erick Jacquin and Rodrigo Oliveira on the program, he remembered only the colleague’s appearance.
“You can’t talk about the beauty of the kitchen without talking about a beautiful woman, a woman who, in a very special way, I fell in love with, called Helena Rizzo”, said Atala in the edition that aired last Tuesday (22) .
After negative repercussions, the cook tried to portray himself on social networks. “I was unhappy to emphasize only Helena’s beauty to talk about the beauty of the kitchen. Helena’s importance for Brazilian cuisine is huge and is not, even remotely, linked to her beauty”, he began.
“I wanted to show that Helena didn’t need to ‘just’ be a genius cook, she had to overcome prejudice, machismo. A machismo so disgraceful and so ingrained that it manifested itself in me without even realizing it”, she added.
Helena Rizzo has already been elected the best chef in the world twice, has won awards and is the only Brazilian woman to receive a star from the Michelin guide.
Without mentioning the name of Alex Atala, the chef turned to social networks to vent about misogyny and machismo and recalled that this has happened to her several times during her career.
“I can’t count the countless times I faced misogyny and machismo in these work environments, the many times I felt uncomfortable and that the ‘best’ I could do was give that awkward little smile from the corner of my mouth and move on” , she began in her speech.
“We were conditioned, in my generation, to normalize harassment, to sweep it under the rug and move on. I’ve always done this, without losing focus on who I was and the path I wanted to take. everything remains the same (if not worse), with the only difference that today we detect this type of situation more easily”, he shot.
Source: Folha
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